5 Practical Tips on Digital Engagement for Events from Tonya Almond

“It’s not just ‘If you build it, they will come’ anymore. It’s ‘If you build it and engage with them, they will stay’.”

Here are some of the top tactics in engagement guru Tonya Almond’s arsenal, her practical advice on how to solve the digital engagement puzzle when having to do more with less. Find the full video on-demand plus a community of peers on Connect.JUNOLive.com.

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1. Slow down and listen. Dial into your audience’s wants and needs and design with them in mind.

‍One size has never fit all. Get the feedback from all segments of your audience by asking many times in many different ways. What’s going on in their lives or their industry that you can help solve for? Tonya says it can be as easy as social media polls, a quick Survey Monkey, requiring some strategic questions in registration, or setting up the conversations and focus groups at your main event for users to sound off (Conversation Starters at PCMA’s Convening Leaders, for example). People want to feel heard, and the sometimes the conversation is just as important as the content. Use that to your advantage.
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2. Dive into analytics; it’s untapped oil in your backyard.

The things your users are NOT telling you are equally as important as what they are. If your audience isn’t buying or watching something, maybe it didn’t hit the mark. Or maybe the marketing needs to be tweaked. Where are they disengaging? Is your content too long? Your analytics have the answers that could drive your next success.

‍Need to know what to look for? Where to start? We got you! Register for our next webinar in the series with Joe Colangelo, Bear Analytics.

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3. Ask yourself if everything needs to be hybrid.

Your audience deserves a choice, but not every experience needs to be blended! Be strategic in your overall engagement strategy by ramping up engagement digitally pre-event and cultivate that FOMO feeling onsite to digital audiences to drive attendance to live events. Helping your users process the information again digitally with roundtables, 1:1 connection to subject matter experts and on-demand libraries post-event reinforces your value proposition.

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4. Orchestrate serendipitous moments by scheduling in white space.

Make sure your users have the scheduled white space, even digitally, to process everything they’re learning. Ideas include digital networking breaks such as breakout sessions after a technical presentation, or for pre-recorded sessions, have the speaker do an AMA in the live chat to build engagement with the expert and give your users a completely unique experience.

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5. Reuse and repurpose.

Content is king, but often your users just didn’t see it. “Sometimes we move on too quickly,” says Tonya. “We’re like ‘hey, we need new content, because nobody looked.’ But do you know how many messages people are getting inundated with? It doesn’t mean that it necessarily didn’t hit. Send the information in a different way. Sometimes we may think ‘oh it’s not what they want; it could be that maybe they just didn’t see it or they didn’t have time.”

When it comes to repurposing content, consider catering to all different learning styles, technology use, and personalities. Create micro content, courses and even volunteering opportunities, schedule shorter presentations paired with longer conversations. Design with the future and your audiences need to connect in mind.

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Want to keep the conversation going? Join us at our next solution-based webinar on May 24 with Joe Colangelo, Bear Analytics where we’ll tackle another big elephant in the room: Data. Register now!

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